


Together

by Registered111



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Friendship/Love, Gen, Pre-Canon, Self-Hatred, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-17
Updated: 2016-12-17
Packaged: 2018-09-09 07:15:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8880868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Registered111/pseuds/Registered111
Summary: Try as they might -- despite everything -- Chara could not understand or be understood.But at least they can smile for him.





	

She turns away from the bed, and looks at me as she should have from the start.  
  
Fire, fire burning in her eyes. I’d always wondered what her rage might look like, from the moment I first saw her standing above me, so much bigger, broader and stronger than even the worst, most brutish person. Worst _**human**_. Anger, yet confusion – betrayal, isn’t it? What else could it be? What else could she look at me with, now. This, at long last, makes sense. The illusion is broken. I feel relief stab through my heart. This must be relief, mustn’t it?  
  
It’s only truth taking it’s course. This is inevitability. And I feel my face pull taut, my loyal smile coming across my features, unbeckoned, knowing on its own when it was needed. Right where it belongs.

She trembles as she inhales, glaring down at me – and a familiar hand, white fur clad in green and yellow bands rises up between us. His tiny, fearful voice speaks quickly, shaking and placating.  
  
“It wasn’t their fault,” he pleads, and somehow, beyond my understanding, he means it. He _means_ it. Through choking tears, his words spill out, speaking of pie and recipes and butter and flowers and apologies. Of just a simple mistake. Her eyes stare through her own son with that burning gaze that should be meant for me alone -- he is not _meant_ for scorn that is mine -- but then, piecemeal, it changes.  
The fury blunts, the confusion clears, and horror begins to creep into her features. As it rightly should for him. _He_ was only mistaken. Yet then she turns back to me, looking at me just the same. An expression of pity and grief and apology that only her child deserves. The betrayal she should feel – the truth she should know, _has to know now_ , gone, disappeared.  
  
And just like that, he’s done it. Brave words spoken through heartache and undue guilt, in boundless faith, and those eyes that can see the good in my _nothing_ have convinced her. A magic spell, to repair the illusion of his world. And she looks at me now with those eyes as well, his reflected in her own. Still hurt, even still with a fading ember of anger. But more than anything, full of love.  
  
“ _hhhht, hhh_ ”  
  
The sound catches me off guard as much as it does them both. At first, I can’t understand where it came from, but then I feel it surging up from my churning stomach, through my lungs and past my over-stretched lips.  
  
“ _ha hhh ha ha…_ ”  
  
Laughter wells up within me, irresistible, and why oughtn’t it? Isn’t it funny? Buttercups and cups of butter. Betrayal and forgiveness and mistakes. Gratitude and _poison_. Monsters and _humans humans **humans**_.  
It’s just _so funny_.  
  
“Buttercups,” I say, between hoarse giggles, staggering back heedlessly, my mind screaming and throbbing with hilarity. My laughs turn watery as my smile grows and vision blurs, only for more pain and sympathy to swell in her countenance.  
  
I hear a name, my name from my side, and so turn to look at the face of someone who thinks of himself as my brother. I swear I see a spark of fear dancing beyond the veil of his tears and I pray he _understands_.  
That he just, for just once, finally, _sees_ me for what I am.

But suddenly, he’s gone, hidden by a sudden rush of steely blue fabric, pressed against my face. She’s kneeling before me, still above my shoulders, crushing me close, as I keep laughing and laughing _and laughing_.  
“Oh, my child…”  
  
It’s too funny. Far too funny to bear. I try to push away between rasping laughs, but she’s still so big and strong. I stay pinned by just one arm along my back, as she embraces her true child with her other. I feel myself lifted up with ease, unable to fight it, out of breath as I am. Without choice, I pull myself closer, burying my mouth into her shoulder and looking over it, tittering and hiccuping.

On the bed, my victim sits, forcing himself upright as he can bear, so much larger and grander than even her, yet looking so weak and wasting already. And in his eyes, hurt. Hurt not of the flesh, but the soul.

  
Pain for his child. His “children.” **_Me_**. Even when my nature comes through and sickens his body, his heart will never waver. Never with anger for his own sake, no matter how much it is owed.  
  
I am still “his child,” as much I am her’s. And to the child held next to me, reaching his hand too across my back, he will still be so happy to think of himself as my brother.  
  
I force my face roughly into her shoulder, and feel her shake as I laugh. It’s too much too much too much. These people are just _so far too much_.

I can’t stand it any more.  
  
  
—  
  
Time passed, and the man who yet hopes I can think of him as a father recovers, his strength returning soon enough.  
  
Despite everything, neither he nor his son ever put the blame on me they ought. They called it a mistake, and they called it innocent, as if both can be true at once. And _I_ am the one who they offered comfort.  
My victim's wife and my friend's mother, her as well, never looked at me again with the eyes she did in that beautiful, awful moment, either.  
Always she watched me closely when I was near, true. But with the wrong concern.  
  
Try as I might, as fate might, even my poison could break their illusion of my being "family." So I wore my smile, as I'm wished to. And I silenced my laughter, as I ought to.  
  
  
I thought often of golden flowers. I always do.  
  
—  
  
  
My steps plop wetly along the cavern floor, purposefully avoiding the deepest puddles for once. I trace the trail of bare but padded footprints up across the floor, and at last see their owner.

He sits on the ground against the rocky wall, his knees pulled up to his chest and held loosely. No doubt he heard my steps coming down the hall, but he keeps his gaze turned away, even as I near and come to a stop next to him.  
  
I know the pattern of how this should go, and the knowledge buzzes oddly behind my eyes.  
I should say “ _Greetings_ ” in the tone he likes, and he should respond with his true cheerfulness, “ _Howdy!_ ” It would be right. It would be good. It should be allowed to _be_ good.  
  
He still looks afar, towards the darkness, sitting under the closest the Underground has to real rain, and I feel his chill.

  
It’s not _as_ it should be, and so the pattern cannot hold.

But how could it be as it should, when it’s me who’s the one standing here? The very thought of it sends tickles through my chest. I crush the laugh in my throat.  
  
  
My hand clenches, trembles around the umbrella’s handle with a sound too rough. I want to toss it away and collapse into him, and babble out pathetic apologies, as if I have the right.  
But he wouldn’t want to hear it, even now.  
  
I want to take it and crash it against the rocks again and again, ‘til I see it tear and splinter into shiny fragments and vivid petals, to see them fly, to let him see what a human is. As if he could.  
But he would want that even less.  
  
  
So instead, I simply force my mouth open. Immediately, it wavers tremulously with traitorous, selfish words, forcing me to bite hard, roughly grinding molar against molar.  
Pause, a swift exhale, and then I finally spit out his name.

“Asriel.”  
  
His head raises fractionally, shoulders quivering. He angles his head askew, just enough to see me and reveal a wetness to his eyes that the environment is not to blame for.  
He takes a slow, deliberate breath, and it sounds as a sigh.

“Chara.”  
  
  
I can’t think of what to say next, so I don’t. I turn with my back against the wall and sit on my knees to his side. With unusual instinct, I shift the umbrella to cover him from the hall’s constant dripping.  
At least there’s that.  
  
We sit, damp and quiet. I try and I think and I think, but all that comes to mind is the vacuous thought of how wet my pant-legs are getting as I sit.  
I can’t even bring out my smile, somehow, despite the awful tickle in my heart.  
  
Even after the buttercup pie – especially after, for only wrong reasons – Asriel still always wanted to stay at my side. Always happy to, to, to _engage_ with this phantom of a person he sees me as.

So I don’t know why, today, he went off on his own. Why he’d come to the singular dampest place in Waterfall alone. I don’t know why, and I fear to ask.  
Fear that he might have finally seen through his own kindhearted spell. Fear to hope again that he finally understands.  
  
  
I hear him shift and stir, and realize my hesitation has forced him to be the one to act.

“Are mom and dad looking for me, too?”  
  
  
I blink, the thought of Toriel and Asgore popping into my head at their mention. “No,” I say.

“At least, I wouldn’t think so. I didn’t go back,” an instant’s pause between words, measuring proper nouns and enunciation, “ _to_ Home after school.” _Not my home,_ I remind myself.  
  
"Oh…”  
  
  
It’s not uncommon for us to not hurry back to Asriel’s home after we get out, and it hasn’t been _so_ long that they would have reason to worry or search, best as I can read our patterns.  
Soon enough, perhaps, but not quite yet.

But then, it is not in the patterns for Asriel to go off on his own, either. And for him to mention them now, so expectantly…  
  
  
I want to chew on my thoughts, but I’ve pondered to myself long enough. “Did something happen?” No, a stupid question, weak. Ask the real one.

“Why did you go off on your own, Asriel?”  
  
For a passing instant he lets me see his dew-welled eyes clearly, before his face puffs and pouts in awareness, turning away once again. “Nothin’. I…”

Hastily, he brings his sleeve up against his eye and wipes, puffing out his chest.  
“I just wanted t'be alone. And I don’t wanna’ go home yet.”  
  
  
The gesture pulls at a memory  
  
            "Are you…?“ A manufactured chuckle, not even an honest one. "Come on, Asriel. Big kids don’t cry.”  
                                     
and I must choke another burst of laughter before it spews out.  
  
  
Not as through I am above consequence in this, either. Though, nor is it as through I don’t understand a need for solitude, even if, for him it seems so…

My gaze bends down, and the motion becomes a shallow nod. “Alright.” I stand the umbrella’s handle on its butt, propping two of its arms against the back wall, snagging one of them in an outcropping. I move to stand, turn, to let him have his time alone –  
  
Again, his hand interrupts. This time it takes mine in its grip, tenuous and needing, as he looks up to me with something like regret coloring his face.  
“No, it’s okay,” he says quickly. “I - I was – I’m happy you came. Stay, please?”  
  
I hesitate, but I needn’t think twice about it. With a stronger nod and his hand still around mine, I sit back down, squeezing back lightly in reciprocation.  
I call again for my smile, the smile he likes so much, but… Again, it fails to come. I can’t understand it. Its reluctance is beginning to be maddening.  
  
  
“I’m sorry, Chara.”  
  
Not as maddening as how I can’t understand _him_ , of course. With more honesty and energy than I should be allowing myself, I blurt out “ _Why_?”  
Confusion buds swiftly across his face, and I _can’t stand it_. “Why would –” Control, bring it back within the patterns, at least _try_ , human.  
“What are you apologizing to _me_ for?”  
  
  
“Cuz’ I made you worry.” He looks at me as if it’s the most obvious thing, the most worthwhile reasoning. “And I…” I can feel the tickle pull at my insides again, too much, he’s just  
  
  
suddenly, his expression turns dark. Dark, darker, yet darker still, as his gaze falls down to our entwined hands, staring through the space between them, drawn out as if by gravity.

  
The tickle falters and dies, and it occurs to me how cold his hand is, despite its gentle, dense fur.  
I try to speak, and it comes out a whispered nothing as I study the alien, hollowed countenance spread across my best friend’s face.  
“Asriel…” My voice – mine? Sounds wrong. It’s not the right tone. Too small, too… It doesn’t match the patterns. None of this matches the patterns. This isn’t a good story. None of this is _right_.  
  
I can’t see his eyes now, but his brows furrow as he inhales through set, clenched teeth. He holds at my hand a tad more strongly, regarding it too closely.

“Chara.” His tone, his eyes, his heart… I realize I _have_ seen this before. There is less fear this time, more strength, but it is the same spirit, the same conviction as when he came so courageously, _stupidly_ to my defense those weeks ago.

"Tell me the truth, please.”  
  
  
I realize how cold _I_ am. And it, too, is familiar. The chill of relief, of broken illusions. But it burns now and it’s _wrong_ , because he shouldn’t be the one who is – who has to…  
I think, and I swallow, and I nod. “I promise.” It may even be the truth, in the moment I say it.  
  
He looks at me as if it was what he expected to hear, what had to be heard, yet not what he wanted.  Even so… “Then, t-tell me…” I hear his teeth click as his jaw works.

  
“Why did you climb the mountain?”  
  
  
_It’s so cold.  
_  
  
What is my relief jabs in with certainty, through me, cutting a deep gash down my spine. I look into his eyes, studying them closely. Soft, concerned, still so full of love, yet…  
I see the flame flickering, deep within.  
My loyal smile returns, right when it wasn’t called.  
  
“You know why,” and my voice is within the patterns and expectations again, measured and wrong in the correct ways. “I told you all about it, a long time ago now.”

  
I recall it, the reason Asriel needed to hear. To shore up the spell he sees within me, to make it perfect – the far better story than the stupid, faltering, flailing truth.  
I call at its name and it comes, to be recited once more.

The truth. “The people,” _no_ , “the _humans_ of my village were callow, cruel and wicked – as true with all humans. They had no love of me – none of them – and I, none for them. There was _nothing_ there for me.”

The twist. “But, despite how they tried to hide it, the villagers knew of another world. Of a people, better, kinder and wiser than them by far, whom they and their ancestors feared, and so did imprison long ago.”

The better story. “And so, one day I fled from their sight and into the mountain they had sealed away with their hollow rumors, seeking you, those–”  
  
  
“ _ **Stop it**._ ”  
  
  
It is spoken as a command, and I find myself abiding. Only now do I register how Asriel’s claws have dug tighter around my hand as I spoke, stern and seeking.  
I look at him, his shoulders trembling and taut. I feel them shake through my chest.  
“You _promised_ , Chara. You JUST promised!” He looks into my eyes, burning through them. “I – Even if it’s not what I wanna’ hear – just _tell me_.”  
  
Wrong, it’s wrong. My smile – it’s wrong. It’s shape is all wrong, I can _feel_ it. His glare is far more wrong and I can’t stand it. Does he want to wake up from his dream?  
I don’t understand, can’t understand, and I don’t know what to do... Don't I?  
Despite myself, despite the patterns failing, I realize I do know what I’m feeling.

Reluctance and remorse. That, despite what everything else in my soul knows to be right, that I’m _not ready_ for this to end, yet. I don’t want him to wake from his dream.  
  
  
But it’s too late, isn’t it? Too soft, too soft for me, my words burble up. “It-it doesn’t have to be a–” And they’re still too true to say anyway.  
“It’s, it’s true. I’m telling you the–”  
  
“Just stop–” His hand whips away, and with a rush of air, I see the umbrella scatter and fall, knocked aside as Asriel rushes to his feet. “Stop LYING!”  
He’s looming above, hands balled into tight fists and arms quaking, and he looks so much like his mother it _hurts_. So angry and afraid and –  
“Do you think I’m an _idiot_ , Chara!? Did-did you think that I never…”  
  
His hands swing harshly down to his sides, his head wobbling slowly, side-to-side. “I _know_ why you came here. I’ve _always_ known.”  
His eyes square on me, and beneath the drizzle, all at once, they look as though they’d never seen anything in me but the truth.

And yet, somehow, they love me anyway.

  
  
“You came here to – to **_disappear_**.”  
  
  
  
I sit, looking up at him dumbly.  
“You knew,” I say and feel still dumber.  
  
His shoulders slump and his frown fall in equally saddened measures. “You didn’t know… _No one_ knows we’re here. Humans don’t even think we ever _existed_ , most of 'em. And Mt. Ebott…”  
Both of his hands grasp at the opposite arm’s elbows, pinning his forearms against his waist. “You said it yourself, remember? It, it’s a place that 'no one ever returns from’.”  
Gradually, he draws out a sigh. “So, why else would anyone _want_ to come here…?” Something not half-unlike a faltering smile comes to his face as he shrugs.  
  
  
Try as I might, I can’t understand it. My voice is wrong and it sways more wrongly, in watery, strained tones.  
“If – If you knew that, then why did you…?” I’m coming to my feet now too, and I didn’t tell myself to do that. It’s wet and it’s cold but it feels _hot_. “If you _knew_ _what I was_ , then, why did you–!?”

I can’t complete the thought, can’t give it focus. The span is far too broad. Why _any_ of this? If you know, then why did you stay? Why do you let _me_ stay? _I **nearly killed dad** , what else could you see in me!?_

  
His hands shoot open towards me, palms up, fingers splayed, holding, pleading. “Because I CARE about you!”  
_I can’t understand._

Fire burns in his eyes, under the dew and pain. “I let you tell me that story – I acted like I believed be-because– cuz’ you _needed_ to tell it.”  
      _I can’t understand._

He stares and he prays I can and it’s not relief at all and it never was. “Because you _needed_ me to 'believe’ it – because you needed a reason to trick yourself – to _understand_ why I believe in _you_.”  
      It’s cold, it’s hot, it’s not good, it’s wrong, he’s right, he’s **insane** , it’s _not funny_.  
“I **_can’t_** understand!” My voice too wet, too soft, but it’s true and it’s awful.  
  
  
“Argh!” He brings his hands up through the fur on his head, all but clawing, aggravation rippling through his expression. “And I can’t _explain_ it! I just knew – you needed me to hear it. Like…”  
His face whips from side to side. “J-just like I need the _truth_ , now! I need to know, I NEED to know if–”  
He tucks his head down and away, eyes pinned shut. “Do you still _want_ to disappear, Chara?”  
  
I freeze again, and it’s not cold any more. It’s not anything, as I stare, looking into that face and its misery, trying, trying harder than I can remember ever trying, to understand just a bit.  
I know the answer, but I don’t know _what he wants_.  
  
“B-because,” he starts and falters, choking for an instant. “Because if you d-do… Then… _Fine_.”  
He looks back up to me, eyes wet again, staring and burning. “I-I don’t know why you wanted to – I don’t know why you hate humans so much, or-or hate _yourself_ so much –”

  
Before I can speak, his hand rises up gently but decisively, palm held out in a halt. “And I won’t ask. I-I owe you that much.”  
       He “owes” me, _I can’t understand I can’t **I can’t**_.

 

“But if you do… If no matter what I do, I still can’t…” He mouths _save you_ , but it comes out as silence.  
“I won’t hate you. I promise.” His gaze keeps stuck on the ground, my shoes. “But if you’re just gon-gonna’ vanish one day like mom and dad and leave me all alone, then…”

Swiftly, his eyes shoot up, teeth bared in anguish. “Then please, just _tell me.”  
  
  
_ I look and I look, and at last, I understand. A piece, only a piece perhaps, but I  _do_ understand. I see the feeling in my heart resonate across his expression. I see someone who’s not ready for this to be over yet.  
Someone who sees through lies -- something somehow only _now_ I see myself. Someone who sees things that _aren’t there_ , but isn’t fooled by _falsehood_ , however that works.  
So he won’t accept a lie.  And I don’t have the truth in me that he needs.  
  
But for this, I still have an answer. I try to swallow, bring a measure of moisture back into my throat before I look up at him. I don’t try to fix my smile or my eyes, right or wrong.  
Whatever is there to _be_ seen – whatever it is _he_ sees –  let it be seen.

“I’m not going to disappear,” and even if it’s not true, I will _make_ it true. “I won’t leave you alone. I promise.”  
  
  
He studies me, and there’s still something in his eyes – the briefest of winces? But he quickly shuts them tight, nodding, his hands releasing out of tight knots.  
  
I look on for a moment and ponder… I am acutely aware of my limitations. I know where my strengths and weaknesses lie.  
Along with most of the affectionate-caring emotional spectrum, I am worse than laughable at physical comfort.  
But despite everything… I step near him, lifting my arms awkwardly around his waist and under his arms, pulling myself close to him in my approximation of a hug.

I think I’d give it a C minus, but the gesture seems to satisfy, nevertheless. At least, Asriel returns it swiftly and with gratitude, his stubby snout pushing onto my shoulder as he sniffles.  
  
We stay together like that in another frozen moment, and it almost feels warm in the way that it should.  
  
  
“Oh,” he speaks up, and I can hear a rueful smile in his tone. He pulls away marginally, looking aside. “Sorry.”

I follow his gaze to the discarded umbrella, laying sadly askew in the hall.

“I got you all wet too…”

  
I look at him and his sheepish grin.  
And I laugh.  
It’s the strange, strange sort of laugh. The kind that’s not cold and ticklish and acrid, but… Pleasant. Melodious and welcome.

  
I feel this smile on my face, not my own, and it too feels _right_ in those rare, incorrect ways that my loyal one does not.  
The smile I feel in my eyes and my soul. Laughing still, I know the truth…  
  
_This smile.  
This laughter.  
They’re not mine, but YOURS._  
  
And, despite everything, that’s alright.  
  
  
  
_“But if you’re just gon-gonna’ vanish like mom and dad–”  
  
  
  
_ I register the change in his expression in response to me before I recognize that mine had shifted first.  
“Asriel,” I say as I feel it in my stomach, wrong in the correct ways, as usual. “What did you mean about mom and dad – leaving you alone…?”  
  
He looks at me, the tones in his face shifting quickly from surprise to realization to a sort of self-aimed consternation. “Of course,” he says, still looking sheepish, but now through a frown. “You wouldn’t know.”

Yet again, I cannot understand, but far more quizzical this time. He pulls away to retrieve the umbrella, bringing it over to me again, covering us both. Resignation colors his features. “You deserve to, though…”  
  
“What’s wrong?”  
  
“Nothing. Nothing’s _wrong_ ,” he says quickly, shrugging sadly. “Just something about our nature.”  
“Us monsters, I mean,” he adds with a skewed grimace.  
  
  
—  
  
We walked through the rainy cavern hall, and he told me in his hesitant, innocent manner of the nature of monster ages and lifespans. Of how some age in a human’s scale of time, but others live for far, far longer.  
He told me of the strongest breed of monster – that which he and his parents belong to, and he takes it with good humor when I can’t help but call him out on them actually being named “Boss Monsters.”

Apparently it was the ancient first King of their race who dubbed them as such. The King who began the lineage that resulted in, unsurprisingly, Asgore. I guess… bad names _really_ run in their family??  
I fear for Asriel.

He told me too of the unique nature of their souls, as well. Of the uncommon strength they possess, of their momentary ability to persist after death…  
And at the crux of the topic, how their power flows from parent to child. How Asgore and Toriel existed for _millennia_ beneath the barrier, and began to age from their prime only after Asriel was born.  
How, inevitably, eventually, they will die. How this isn’t regrettable or sad, but just natural. He almost sounded as he he believed it while he recited the sentiment. Almost.

  
This much I understood, at least. He was grateful, acting as if I’d be angry with him for… Forgetting to let me know sooner? I really never will understand him. But that’s okay, or at least not unbearable.  
I certainly never presumed his parents wouldn’t age, and even then… _He’s_ the one who should be sad over their passing when it comes, right? What I feel for them shouldn't _matter_.  
Regardless though, this new information couldn't help but itch at me, drawing up a host of curious questions…  
  
—  
  
  
“Well, I just mean… How do you keep a positive birthrate?”  
  
Asriel looks at me funny, and I’m not sure if he’s bemused more by the question or the wording. Somehow the glint in his eye tells that it’s kind of both. Whatever.  
“Uh, same way as any species, I guess? More Boss Monsters had two or more kids than had one kid.”  
  
A fairly obvious response, actually, and my cheeks feel a little more red than usual for asking it. “Well, okay, just – It’s kind of just – mechanically unusual?”  
  
Asriel shrugs, muttering “I suppose so,” as he does.  
  
  
I step onward – and feel the drizzle hit my head and shoulders. Instantly I spin back, and see Asriel stopped in place, still holding the umbrella.  
His expression slants dark and distant again, and I feel my stomach flutter. “Asriel, what–”  
  
He snaps up in shock, then moves forward with a cringe. “Sorry, sorry!” Immediately he is at my side once more, but the feeling doesn’t abate.  
  
“What’s wrong? Did–” It tickles awfully. I squirm beneath my smile. “Did I say something wrong…?”  
  
Too quietly, he studies me, and I can hear words unspoken within his eyes. “No,” he begins. “It’s nothing you did. It’s just…”

  
He inhales, shrinking into himself with a smile that is much too sad for someone who reminds me so often how young he really is.  
“That’s kinda’ why I wasn’t there after school. Why I got mad…” _  
He was... Angry?_    
“At mom and dad, I mean,” he clarifies, perfectly answering my confusion with more of the same.  
  
He reads the bewilderment in me despite my smile. And with a pained, patient tone, begins to explain anew.  
“I… I _always_ wanted a sibling. Ever since I was old enough to know about how we – Boss Monsters – uhm, reproduced? And didn’t get old and die if we never have kids…”  
He chews absently, eyes scanning across the wall.

“I mean, I’d kinda’ always wanted a sibling, even before that. To have a _real_ friend my age, or around it at least. But ever since I could _understand_ how mom and dad would die one day, and… And I wouldn’t?”

 

      Time stalls and sputters.       _And I wouldn’t_ replays in my mind _._       _That **I won’t** **ever die**_ , the thought completes _._

  
  
Realization, all too late, dawns upon my stupid, stupid, _stupid_ head.

That Asriel has _only_ spoken of his race outside of his family in _past_ tense.

I feel metal crunch and twist into my chest.  
  
  
“I wanted to have someone to… To be able to share it with. The time.” His gaze rises up to the ceiling, watching the droplets fall, one by one, and I can’t ever, _ever_ see what he can see. “Eternity, I guess.”  
He shores up a smile to the walled off sky and it’s wrong, it’s so, so wrong, it’s _not right_. The patterns, the story, none of it’s right.  
“But they wouldn’t. Mom and dad – they won’t have another kid. They’re resolved. It’s… Tradition?”  
“And it’s,” his smile falls into a sneer and it couldn’t be more wrong, “ _strategy_.” It’s not right that he should have to–  
  
“Cause’, see, if a couple only has one kid… The children always got their parents’ power split evenly between them, right?”  
"So if they had only one child, that one always grew up stronger for it. And because of that, Royal Family has always ever only had one child. For the strength of… The lineage. For our race – for all monsters.”  
“And us being the only three left doesn’t _change_ that. Shouldn’t. Especially _because_ if I’m the only one left down here, to rule… Then, for everyone… I have to be as strong as I can be.”  
  
  
His eyes are shut to the mountain above his head – the world above, stolen from him long before his birth – and a calm, heart-wrought smile takes root beneath them and it’s all _**wrong**_.

        Asriel, you shouldn’t ever, _ever_ have to look like that.  
  
I hear him swallow as his head tilts back down to face me, that smile, forced but not fake, still cast over his countenance. His eyes are still shut, and yet still I know he is seeing something wondrous in the nothing.  
“I try not to be mad at them, at mom and dad, but… It gets to me, sometimes. I mean, I guess I should be grateful though, right?”  
  
  
“ _What,_ ” I say, and it’s wrong it’s wrong it’s _not funny_.  
  
  
“Well, think about it. That makes me…” He picks his shoulders up in an exaggerated shrug, and some part of me recognizes it’s meant to be jovial. “The Final Boss, right?”  
At last, he opens his eyes, and his smile instantly collapses, pulling away in something like horror.  
  
I don’t know what my face is doing any more. I just know it’s far, far too honest and true, and he doesn’t deserve to see it, he doesn’t deserve _any of this_.  
  
“Oh,” he says too softly, the sorrow in that smile now coming to his eyes, buoyed by regret. He reaches up to me across the tiny distance between us, trembling fingers touching at my cheek. “Oh, Chara…”  
“I’m so, so sorry.” His words are quiet, but strong and sure. Like it’s the most obvious thing in the world to say – the only thing anyone could say.  
  
  
Everything he’s been through. Everything his family, his people have been through. Being _trapped forever_ under this mountain. Being _slaughtered_ by **_humans_** , because they were “ _afraid_ ” of those who could not fight back.  
And me, _**me**_ , I am what the world gives him in recompense. Me, the best excuse for a “sibling” he ever gets to have. Me, who only came here to die and _failed_. _Me_ , who _still_ one day _will_ die and leave him alone anyway.  
_Me_ , who almost _killed his father_ because I dared to be _grateful_. _Me_ , who can’t ever, _ever_ , **_ever_** be even half the person he thinks me to be. **_Me_** , the person who still, despite everything – try as I might – he _still_ loves most.  
  
       He’s the one who apologizes to me.  
  
  
  
I step back, slowly, swiftly, surely, suddenly, into the false rain. The locket he gave me, slung over the collar of my sweater, sways against my chest.  
  
I feel my sins crushing around my neck.  
  
  
  
      It’s             _too_     ** _much_**  
  
  
  
My hand grabs at the tiny    dangling     red heart    rips it away with the tinny sound of tearing metal    and flings it as far away as it can.   

It collides against the rocky wall   with a dull ting.  
  
His gaze follows my hand and the locket as it flies    the remorse in his eyes giving way rapidly to surprise    and then dismay.   He turns back to face me    a silent plea on gaping lips.  
  
My words come    and the tone isn’t right    isn’t what he should hear    isn’t what he deserves    but what about this _is?_

“You”   I say.   “You say you don’t know why I hate humans.”  
                     

I glare    and I pray    and I pray    that he finally understands.       

“I hate humans    because humans have always been    and will _always_ be     **_evil_**.”  
                        

“I hate _**me**_ ”    my hands lift in the chilly    dewy    air    grasping    holding    pleading    hopeless    “because I am an _exceptional_ human.”  
                                                                                

“And    try as I might    I remain    and always _will_ remain     _**myself**_.”

 

Asriel stares onward into me, and I see a thousand emotions crash through his features.  
From shock to stunned bewilderment, anguish, empathy, a flash of rage, falling sorrow, and finally a desperate, fearful hope.  
“You’re _not evil_ , Chara,” and I hear the spell in his words, that spell made of love that summons something from nothing.  
And I want, I _want more than anything_ to believe in it.  
I’m not ready to wake up. I’m still not ready for this to be over yet.

  
But I will not be bound to him    and not have _him_ bound to _me_    for one moment longer.  
  
  
I turn on my heel    and I run away.  
  
  
  
  
  
About seven feet away,  
before my foot slips in a puddle  
and sends me careening into the ground with a particularly pathetic, squishy,

 _fwompsh_.

 

I find myself unable to even be surprised, let alone stir or stand. I lay against the ground and breathe out a burbling sigh into it.  
  
  
Me, who can ruin even such a perfectly awful moment.  
  
  
Sure enough, as if it even needs to be said, Asriel is right at my side, umbrella held over me, hand pressed against my shoulder, speaking hurriedly. “Are you okay?”  
  
“I’m fine,” I mouth up around the floor, motionless besides. “It’s cool. I’m in my element.”  
  
He stammers briefly, then tuts, grasping onto the back of my shoulder and shaking it gently.  
“Pff- What element is _that_ supposed to be? Are soggy rocks made of _drama_ , now?” He titters quietly, and I mimic it, as I should.

“C'mon,” he pulls again momentarily, before reaching the hand down low enough I can see it even as I lie flat. “Let me help you up.”  
  
  
I press up off the floor a bit, enough to take his hand and allow him at least that request. He asks me if I’m alright again once I'm upright – and it occurs to me that he really does more often remind me far more of his father than his mother. I don’t feel much of anything, for good or ill. I press up against my nostrils with two fingers. They come away mostly clean – at least no blood. Good enough, I think. “Yeah.”  
  
Relief – the real thing, the one that _real_ people feel – passes across his expression as he makes a shaky nod.  
  
I glance to the side, scanning along the wall – and leave the shelter of the umbrella again, kneeling down to pick up the target of my ingratitude.  
The necklace’s cloth band looks undamaged but for some minor straining in one part, and the locket itself looks in fair condition, considering. Its broken clasp and some scraping along its side seem like the only issues.  
The mechanism seems pristine – The locket’s door pops open as easily as ever, revealing our pictures on the heart’s halves and the inscription along their interior rims.  
  
  
It says “Best Friends Forever.”  
  
Forever.  
  
  
The droplets abate as Asriel walks close to me again. I look up at my best friend and hope it’s something that looks like misery and apology staining my eyes. “I’m sorry, Asriel.”  
  
“It’s okay,” he says, because of course he does. I stand and he prods at the locket. “It’s little dinged up is all. Nothing that we can’t fix.” He smiles at me, and perhaps it’s at last a bit guarded.  
  
I give him my smile back, as it is the least he deserves. _No, he deserves so much more than this._ “You’re right.” I consider the locket in my hand, wondering what he’d want his parents to hear about it.  
I would prefer to admit that I broke it out of spite and hate because I am a particularly odious human being, but… Asriel would be unhappy for it.  
And I’ve given him – and will give him yet more to come – more than his fair share of unhappiness.

I guess we’ll just say we broke it accidentally… Playing? In Waterfall? Caught on something and tore. Sure, it’s not implausible. Why not.  
  
  
“Let’s go home, Chara.”  
  
  
I raise my line of sight back up to him, in careful consideration. Consideration of myself, reflected through his eyes. Can I pretend to be the person he needs me – they all need me to be, right now?  
My hand clenches around the damaged keepsake – a token of love, of _family_ I tried to toss away like garbage – and shudders.  
“You go on ahead,” I say, and I register his disappointment immediately, despite how quickly he tries to conceal it.

“I’m sorry,” and I do mean it. “I guess it’s my turn to – I just… Need a bit of time alone is all.”  
  
  
He shores up another smile, and this one is _utterly_ false, repugnant – but at least it’s better for him to have to wear this than that other one. Anything but that, anyone but him…  
“Okay,” he nods. “I understand.” He hands me the umbrella back, and I take it a bit vacantly. Looking up ahead, I realize we’re only about twenty feet from the end of the rainy hall. At least there’s that, I suppose.  
"See ya’ at home then. Though, uh,” he adds, “try not to be too long? Dinner probably’ll be ready soon, y'know.” I assent as best I can, and hope to be truthful about it. With another nod, he leaves the canopy.  
  
Only to stop, and turn back once more, without any smile left on his expression. His mouth hangs open, searching, searching for a chain of words that fit correctly.  
After a moment, his mouth shuts again, and that other, horrible, heartfelt smile returns anyway. What I deserve and what he doesn’t. “Be safe, okay?”  
  
My smile – wrong, but correct, as it has to be but not as it should be – blares back at him with its plastic sheen. “Of course, Asriel. See you later.”  
I did, after all, just make a promise. And no matter anything else about me – _despite_ everything else, and because of it – I do not take the words I give or the bonds I make lightly.  
  
  
And with one last nod and a wave, he turns off, hurrying out of the rain and beyond into the tunnel.  
  
I wave back, til he is out of my sight.

  
The Riverperson ought to be available. It won’t be too long for him to get back to New Home… Or perhaps he can take a bit of detour through Hotland? Let him dry off a bit. He’d feel better for it, I hope.  
I turn my head, considering the umbrella clenched in my hand. Where did I get this from? As yes, the public cans, available for anyone passing through Waterfall to use.  
That’s not great, I suppose – The good people of Waterfall paid for this, after all, for neighborly use – _good_ people, monsters, not _**humans**_ – but at least it doesn’t belong to the Dreemurrs.  
  
I collapse it down with a snap, glancing around. Still no one to be seen, as has been all this time. Sometimes you just don’t run into anyone around these parts, this time of day.  
Pretty glad that one noisy, nosey kid never found us any time during this mess – but then, maybe her interruption would’ve been for the best, to avoid the worst of it?

Oh, who knows. There’s no point in belaboring over what might’ve been when what is and _will_ be looms over all our heads, ready to tear everything apart.  
I inhale. I exhale. Three more times, I repeat the process, considering the flimsy weight of the instrument in my hand. Finally, I inhale as deeply as I can and hold it in torpor.  
  
  
The umbrella’s tip crashes into the rock wall, snapping it loose and sending it flying back behind me.  
I swing again, aiming more deeply into the wall, and the scraping, satisfying shriek of sundering metal and ripping fabric greets me.  
I keep my howls quiet, carefully measured and well-practiced – though intellectually, I know their low tones must carry far, regardless.

I swing and swing again, smashing off more of the umbrella’s arms with each stroke.

With one last great swipe, the entire top apparatus tears off, falling to the side and dangling out some of its internal chain like mechanical entrails.  
I swing the bent, warped shaft a few more times, but to little avail – I can’t even really connect deeply and soundly without risking scraping my knuckles against the wall.

  
And I did promise to be safe.  
  
  
I stand, puffing out hot air into the cold, damp surroundings, shoulders still too square. It was a relief to get that out – I feel the relief coursing through my veins, burning – but it’s not even nearly enough. Not ever. Not for this.

What could, after all, truly make this right?

 

“ _Humans_ ,” I spit like the curse it is. “ _Humans_. **_Humans_**!” I consider swinging the dead pole again – but no. I consider tossing it aside, but not that either.

I look down, at the scattered remains of the umbrella, spread across seven feet in all directions from the wall, and I let myself laugh and _laugh_. Is this, too, not humanity? Is this not what we _give_ the world?  
  
I laugh and I choke and I want to heave. But I lean down and start to collect the scraps – at least the biggest pieces – of torn fabric and ruined parts.

“I thought I understood, you know.” I say to nothing and no one, and they answer as they should.  
“So many times, I’ve thought I _understood_ humans. Understood everything so  _wretched_ about us. But – you – just — keep _surprising_ me!”  
That’s all the big pieces. I look about, and hope there’s a proper garbage can around somewhere – I don’t really want to bring this poor wreck back to the rest of its kin, if only for the sake of their proper owner.

“Every time I think I GET us, you – we just keep topping ourselves. There’s always, _always_ something yet more awful and stupid and cruel and **_pointless_** that we can inflict.”  
It’s hilarious, and finally, I can let myself _be_ myself. I laugh so hard that I nearly drop the trash in my hands. “But this one! Ohhhh, this one… This one is a masterpiece of, of _vileness_.”

I think again on Asriel’s face. Kind, no matter the hideous fate he is condemned to.  
Calm, collected, so much stronger and courageous than anyone allows him to know – myself most of all, because _how could **I** allow him even that much?_  
A face colored with the love in his soul. A face colored with the pain of sins inflicted upon him millennia before he was even born, that are not his to bear. A face _not_ colored by even the smallest resentment, but simply…  
  
  
Simply hope and dreams. His own. His family's. His whole world’s.  
  
  
I laugh so hard I can’t see, hacking, standing in the constant drizzle. Tears rolling down my face, because of course big kids don’t cry, what a joke. It’s just so funny I want to die, but I promised. _I promised not to die_.

 

I laugh and I laugh and I kneel and I laugh and I can’t laugh and I fall and I can’t, can’t laugh and none of it’s funny. I try and I try and no matter how I try I just can’t laugh at it. I can’t even laugh at me.

  
“Asriel,” I warble though my fucking smile, smiling so coldly despite nothing being funny, clinging onto the ragged tatters of the umbrella as if it deserved this either.

I cry silently into the object ruined by my own hands, thinking of gestures, of lockets, of smiles that shouldn’t exist, of buttercups, of everything you truly deserve that I can never ever ever let you have.  
  
  
  
I hear your laughter echo through my voice, across the hall.  
  
  
My head whips up, tracing the source – and I see it, and it _makes sense_.

  
A large, blue flower, gaping at me, laughing at me in my voice -- with a voice not truly my own – laughing a laugh I don’t deserve. Because of course, of _course_ it would be a flower.

  
I scramble on all fours over to it like a beast, tossing the thrashed, abused umbrella’s corpse to the side as I do, My hand grasps around its wide, scratchy stem and it compacts wetly under the pressure.

My instincts, as my instincts only could be, are to tear it right from the ground and grind it into the nothing it should be – yet, I hesitate, and I can’t truly say why.

I listen, smiling into its stigma as it echoes with the laugh you gave me, that I discarded as easily as it was given, as utterly gracelessly as it was not.

And I wonder. Something, I still can’t say what, sends my mind racing.  
  
My imagination whirls, driven by awful genius, and I see its blue petals burst into bright gold.  
  
  
Not the broad, brilliant, grand golden flowers of my true home  
           but tiny, ingenue, unassuming  
                         toxic buttercups.  
  
  
  
I think of souls – humans consuming monsters, but might not monsters consume humans?  
           Wouldn’t that be _funny?_  
                          I think of a gloriously horrific creature, engraved in runes across a wall not so very far from where I sit.  
  
  
  
The flower laughs at me. I laugh at it. And finally, _finally_ I understand.

Finally, I see the way. I see how I can make the lie real, Asriel.

I see how I can give _everything_ you deserve.  
  
  
My gratitude can only be poison. But it shall be a gift given to the **_right_** people.

Given back to the **_humans_** from whence it came.  
  
  
“I’ll keep my promise, Asriel,” I say and I laugh, relief stabbing clear through my back.  
  
     “I won’t disappear. I won’t ever leave you all alone.”

“I,” knowing I at least speak with the conviction of the story that _should_ be,

     “will make it _right._ ”  
  
  
“I’ll be a good partner. And we’ll be together forever, won’t we?”

**Author's Note:**

> Associated art - http://registered111.deviantart.com/art/UNDERTALE-end-game-spoilers-Together-580318824


End file.
